Welcome to the latest edition of Big Style, a portal to a world where clothing meets culture. This week, CNN Style reporter Leah Dolan went to Copenhagen Fashion Week to investigate the city’s real style ID. Have thoughts, questions or feedback? Reach us here: bigstyle@newsletters.cnn.com
Mentioned in this issue: Straw sailor hats, a failed mission, eczema cream, the fashion week circus, toe-first cities, Ella Emhoff, bikes and “Jante law."
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Street style at Copenhagen Fashion Week, Spring-Summer 2027. (Christian Vierig/Getty Images)
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You know the girl I mean. Her hair is slicked back, her skin radiant and glossy. She could be wearing a pinstripe poplin shirt and a sequined midi skirt, probably with Havaianas. Over the last decade, this woman has become algorithmically synonymous with Copenhagen Fashion Week, and I saw many iterations during my three days in the Danish capital. But does she actually represent the city’s style identity?
For the last 20 years, organizers of the event have been working tirelessly to establish Copenhagen as home to the industry’s unofficial fifth fashion week. Knowing it couldn’t compete with the size, history or prestige of Paris, London, New York or Milan, the city broke through the ranks with a smart combination of strong sustainability principles and a huge emphasis on street style. Photographs snapped of beautiful people in quirky, color-clashing outfits with just-biked-back-from-the-harbor tans often generated more international interest than the collections shown by designers. Now as the fashion event ponders the next 20 years of its existence, I wondered to what extent this version of Scandi chic had become a stereotype — and who was pushing against it?
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At the Paolina Russo show, members of the public piled in to watch the procession of acid house beachwear. (James Cochrane)
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My plan this week was to pool opinions and collate the final word on Copenhagen style, an objective that proved foolish pretty quickly. Cities by their very nature are a cross section of age groups, tastes, desires, influences, nationalities, wealth brackets — duh. But speaking to people around the capital, some who work in fashion and many who don’t (important!), I at least got to dig a little deeper into how the Danes approach dressing right now.
One thing that came up incessantly was practicality. I experienced the suboptimal dressing conditions for myself this week, as Copenhagen flipped from torrential rain to warm sunshine in less than two hours. Still, this is a toe-first city where the commitment to sandals seemingly never wanes. Charlotte Eskildsen, co-founder of Danish label The Garment who showed on Wednesday, said function was baked into the DNA here. “You need to be a little practical,” she said of her fellow Scandies backstage. “Even if you wear a dress, you always wear flat shoes.” Jasmine, a 25-year-old Copenhagen native who worked in-store at Danish womenswear brand AF Agger, was concerned her need for comfort and sensibility sometimes made her fashion choices “a bit basic” — but the skies really did rule her wardrobe. “Because I’m biking everywhere, I always have to have some clothes I can put over if it starts raining,” she said. “It can be cold and it can be hot, so therefore you have to think practical.”
But the locals have worked out how to inject a little whimsy into their otherwise utilitarian looks. “That’s what I like about Danish style,” said Sunniva Hartgen, a Norwegian stylist and head of fashion at Oslo Runway. “It’s unexpected and free.” Maria, an influencer from Poland who had flown herself to the city in the hopes of squeezing into some of the public shows, described Copenhagen’s fashion scene as “nonchalant.” “It’s very natural and effortless,” she said. “I think they don’t stress much about it,” agreed her friend and fellow influencer Anna. Their vibe was similarly easygoing: If neither made it into a runway show, just ogling the much-photographed street style in person was enough, they said.
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Ella Emhoff said she feels more comfortable at Copenhagen Fashion Week than any other. (Leah Dolan/CNN)
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From left to right, Anna and Maria, two Polish influencers who traveled to the city to experience the street style culture first hand. (Leah Dolan/CNN)
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Danish ceramicist, jewelry designer and occasional hospital clown Tomas Tex Cenius said the city's fashion scene was "boring." (Leah Dolan/CNN)
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Norwegian stylist Sunniva Hartgen was most excited to see the graduate design collections, as she thought they were "uncolored by the commercial sphere." (Leah Dolan/CNN)
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Model, knitwear designer and stepdaughter of Kamala Harris, Ella Emhoff, who I bumped into fresh off the catwalk for Paolina Russo, echoed the “prioritization of comfort” in Copenhagen versus New York or Paris. “I feel way more comfortable to actually wear what I want to wear here,” Emhoff told me. “Rather than other fashion weeks where I feel like I’m wearing a costume.”
But not everyone I spoke to agreed. Frans Pachner, co-owner of the Copenhagen boutique Maritime Antiques & for 20 years, said he thought the city had become too trend driven. “If somebody finds a style, everybody (jumps) on,” he said. “It’s like baggy jeans, sandals, very loose.” Pachner sells nautical antiques and limited run shirts, jeans and upcycled jackets from small independent brands like Tender Co., who make naturally dyed pieces in Pennsylvania. He and his customers prefer a little exclusivity. They “like it if there's only five or six pieces in Copenhagen,” he said. A local ceramicist and jewelry artist I met at the Henrik Vibskov show went as far as to call the city’s dressing culture “boring” — talk about a hot take! “Even in their weirdness, they all (look) the same,” he argued, referring to the “Jante law” of conformity and humility that dates back to Denmark’s history as a small, insular farming country.
Frame Magazine editor Vésma Kontere McQuillan, who travels to Paris, Milan and Copenhagen to report on the set design of runway shows, pointed out that “dressing up for fashion week in Copenhagen is kind of a new phenomenon.” She’s been coming here for years, and these days feels suspicious of the “circus created for fashion week.”
“I would say the styles that we see on the streets are not what people actually are wearing,” McQuillan said. According to her, the heat is actually at 3daysofdesign — Denmark’s official design festival. The outfits there are much more casual, with “a mix of vintage and a little bit hippie.” That, she said, is Copenhagen’s real style identity.
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I loved this strange peeling coat by Nikolaj Gotthelf. (James Cochrane)
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The Institution show was the talk of the season. (James Cochrane)
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- I thoroughly enjoyed how freaky The Danish Royal Academy fashion graduates got at their show on Tuesday. When so many of the runway shows here are designed explicitly for commercial success, the DRA’s Class of 2026 really stood out. I could go long on any number of the collections but I was particularly drawn to a black and yellow coat by Nikolaj Gotthelf that looked like a rotting banana mid-peel and an enviable tulle skirt adorned asymmetrically with lilac ribbons by Ella Sofia Mannov. I’m certain wearing this would make you feel like a gorgeous best-in-show pony at a country fair.
- Galib Gassanoff’s label Institution was one of the breakout shows of the week. The Georgian designer, who this year won the Zalando Visionary Award, showed a mix of refined draping — from tunics to dresses to gauzy cardigans. There were ballgowns that looked like overgrown trench coats, tulle capes in ivory white, and interesting coats that looked quite aristocratic. While Gassanoff ran wild with his silhouettes, the effect was tempered by a common color palette of neutral tones.
- New York fashion regular Collina Strada made its Copenhagen debut on a windy harbor Thursday night, giving passersby on tourist boats a glimpse of the action. The collection looked right at home, with its patchwork shirred tulle in girlish pastel colors. Some of it reminded me of Danish brand Cecilie Bahnsen, if her stuff had been dredged up from the bottom of the sea.
- I saw a bunch of these little straw sailor hats on the heads of fashion week attendees throughout my trip, and I found them more charming each time. If Copenhagen really is the incubator of mass market trends, they might be coming to a port near you.
- I’ve got to respect Henrik Vibskov, who has been in the game for more than 20 years, and told me he has given up trying to keep abreast of our fast-moving, fractured culture in the hopes of sparking an idea. These days, he looks inwards when dreaming up a show concept. This season he was inspired by a product close to his heart (and skin)... eczema cream. “I’m addicted to cream,” Vibskov said. I must admit while watching the procession of warped glen check skirts, coats and tailored jackets at his show, topical cream was the last thing on my mind. But the whole thing did begin with a bemusing performance centered around moisturizing feet that now makes a bit more sense.
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